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Question

I got my dream job and am about to sign a new employment contract. What should I take into account in the contract?

Answer

When concluding an employment contract, pay attention to the following issues:

Place of work and duties

For the sake of clarity, the place of work and the main duties should be recorded in detail. The more loosely these terms and conditions are written in the employment contract, the more extensive is the employer's power to unilaterally change them.

Annual holiday

If you agree on additional holiday, it should be clearly recorded in the employment contract. In this case, the wording should indicate whether the agreed holiday is paid, whether a holiday bonus will be paid for it and/or whether the agreed holiday compensated for through holiday compensation if it is not taken for one reason or another.

Prohibition of secondary jobs

The employer cannot give orders on the use of the employee’s leisure time or prohibit secondary jobs that are not in competition with the employer's business and do not interfere with the performance of tasks under the employment contract. Therefore, it is advisable to remove prohibitions on secondary jobs from the contract.

Non-competition and liquidated damages

Special care must be taken with non-competition, because after a non-competition agreement has been concluded, the employer may invoke it. A non-compete agreement always requires a particularly weighty reason under the Employment Contracts Act. Therefore, discuss the existence of a particularly weighty reason with the employer. Liquidated damages are problematic for the employee, because the employer does not have to prove the actual extent of loss in the event of a breach. Therefore, it is advisable to either ask for liquidated damages to be omitted from the contract or to reduce the amount of liquidated damages. 

Collective agreement

The name of the applicable collective agreement should be clearly recorded in the employment contract. If no collective agreement is applied to the employment relationship, it is advisable to agree on collective agreement-derived benefits in the employment contract. These include:

• holiday bonus (50% of annual holiday pay)
• maternity and/or paternity leave pay
• pay for temporary childcare leave
• sick pay longer than statutory
• reimbursement of travel expenses and time
• across-the-board increases
• midweek public holidays.

The tips and answers were given by Laura Järvelä, employment lawyer at Professionals of Business and Technology.

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